paralyzing her with its mystery and its
inconceivable sway over her affairs, then she would know beyond doubt
that it was not chance, nor jealousy, nor intimidation, nor ministerial
wrath at her revolt, but a cold and calculating policy thought out long
before she was born, a dark, immutable will of whose empire she and all
that was hers was but an atom.

Then might come her ruin. Then might come her fall into black storm.
Yet she would rise again, and to the light. God would be merciful to a
driven woman who had lost her way.

A week passed. Little Fay played and prattled and pulled at Lassiter's
big black guns. The rider came to Withersteen House oftener than ever.
Jane saw a change in him, though it did not relate to his kindness and
gentleness. He was quieter and more thoughtful. While playing with Fay
or conversing with Jane he seemed to be possessed of another self that
watched with cool, roving eyes, that listened, listened always as if the
murmuring amber stream brought messages, and the moving leaves whispered
something. Lassiter never rode Bells into the court any more, nor did
he come by the lane or the paths. When he appeared it was suddenly and
noiselessly out of the dark shadow of the grove.

"I left Bells out in the sage," he said, one day at the end of that
week. "I must carry water to him."

"Why not let him drink at the trough or here?" asked Jane, quickly.

"I reckon it'll be safer for me to slip through the grove. I've been
watched when I rode in from the sage."

"Watched? By whom?"

"By a man who thought he was well hid. But my eyes are pretty sharp.
An', Jane," he went on, almost in a whisper, "I reckon it'd be a good
idea for us to talk low. You're spied on here by your women."

"Lassiter!" she whispered in turn. "That's hard to believe. My women
love me."

"What of that?" he asked. "Of course they love you. But they're Mormon
women."

Jane's old, rebellious loyalty clashed with her doubt.

"I won't believe it," she replied, stubbornly.

"Well then, just act natural an' talk natural, an' pretty soon--give
them time to hear us--pretend to go over there to the table, en' then
quick-like make a move for the door en' open it."

"I will," said Jane, with heightened color. Lassiter was right; he never
made mistakes; he would not have told her unless he positively knew. Yet
Jane was so tenacious of faith that she had to see with her own eyes,
and so constituted that to employ even such s